Not all martial arts schools are like some schools where they spend years teaching you basic forms and push-hands before you actually learn how to defend yourself.

I went to a karate school once that said 'Always step out with the left foot'. When I asked why, they said, "Oh, it's like blocking with your left arm. It's a sacrifice. If somebody hits you with a baseball bat, then you can defend with your right."

What? You're supposed to allow them to disable you? What about the other guys you're fighting, or maybe once your arm is broken you won't be able to fight effectively because of the pain?

Most martial arts schools are crap when it comes to actually defending yourself.

And I hate to say it but I would put most tai chi schools in this category. Most of the tai chi schools in the U.S. never teach the students how to defend themselves.

YOU SAID:< Not all martial arts schools are like some schools where they spend years teaching you basic forms and push hands before you actually learn to defend yourself....Most martial arts schools(also most Taijiquan schools in the U.S. )are crap when it comes to actually defending yourself. > -XingiBoxer-

I don't know about SOME, or MANY or especially MOST martial arts schools....That is quite a list! How do you come about this knowledge? Have you attended MOST martial arts schools?

My experience...I have been learning self-defense techniques/Taijiquan applications from the BEGINNING of my instruction of the art.

There are various applications for each 'movement'/'posture'/'stance' of the 108 Taiji long form, so you can spend many years learning all the possible applications for self defense.

PRACTICING these techniques is the only way to become efficient in the use of them. It is left up to the student to practice these techniques.

Even spending an hour or two a week sparring in classes would only be productive to a certain degree. A student MUST practice these applications self sufficiently to improve to higher skill.

One method of accomplishing application practice when a sparring partner is unavailable is by practicing FORM. Form after all IS the practice of self-defense techniques, without a partner.

Do you have a sparring partner to work with you three, four, five times a day?I don't...so I practice form.

As for the order of curriculum concerning weapons in Taijiquan, I believe weapons follows afterwards based on the fact that Taijiquan is an INTERNAL art while Karate is an EXTERNAL art. Different art, different methods.

Xingiboxer:Defending against bare handed opponents is pretty basic stuff in any martial art I've ever studied, you are correct there and I bow to that wisdom respectfully. When you are not armed and your opponent is also not armed you only have to learn to defend against their hands, feet, arms, legs, heads, shoulders, elbows, knees, things that can hurt you but not cut you or that are generally able to bludgeon you to death with one blow (I know, some people can, MOST however cannot). So this is basic stuff. This is the first defense type most every martial artist learns.However, when defending against someone with a weapon, most especially when you do not have one, these would certainly appear to be more advanced techniques to me. Let's consider...These types of techniques take a long time to learn, much less perfect, in every style of martial art I have ever made a study of or have heard of in my time. It takes many months of practice to learn how to handle yourself in a fashion that will lead to walking away from such an encounter in one piece. And you must learn different techniques for each type of weapon you are facing, so each weapon type you wish to defend against will take you more time and require a much greater effort than the more "basic" techniques of defense against an unarmed opponent would. You do not use the same techniques to defend against an attacker with a knife that you use to defend against an attacker with a baseball bat, do you? So even if you consider defending against someone with a baseball bat a "basic" defensive technique, it is still a more advanced, or more difficult if you prefer, methodology than the techniques employed against an unarmed opponent.Consider an unarmed first year student, regardless of his style, attempting to defend against someone who is weilding a Manchu broadsword. Do you think that student would consider this type of defense as "basic"? It would almost certainly take someone with a much greater level of skill to come out on top in such an encounter. I have studied martial arts for over twenty years, a few different styles, I have even studied the Manchu broadsword as a weapon type both offensively and defensively, rather extensively. I can tell you without question in my mind that to this day I would not consider this scenario as anything less than an "advanced" art, because even with the knowledge and practice that I have doing that exact kind of thing I could still not be certain that I would prevail unarmed against my opponent.Therefore, these types of techniques do not seem to fit into the "basic" category by any definition that I know of. They would appear to be demonstrably more "advanced" in that they take more time, more skill and greater effort to learn and then to perfect.I have heard weapons called "the great equalizers", because they turn a relatively easy to handle, unarmed opponent into one who is much more deadly for anyone to face. I am puzzled as to why you would consider facing armed opponents not "advanced" compared to unarmed opponents, regardless of style or technique. But...Perhaps I am wrong, I have been before and am willing to admit I may be again.Maybe you would be kind enough to educate me?

Xingiboxer:Your wisdom simply humbles and astounds me. I bow to your obviously greater knowledge on a subject to which I have, obviously and without any knowledge on my part, closed my mind.Go in peace and with a warm glow at the knowledge that you have publicly stood me on my head with your profound insights into a subject on which I have, seemingly, no more room in my mind. Since I can accept no further education on this subject until that happy day when my cup runneth over to the point of once again being in a state in which it can accept filling, may it be the wish of happy providence that some day I will share the heightened sense of awareness that you have chosen to shine down upon us here, however briefly. My profound thanks that you have chosen to even briefly share your seemingly endless cache of wisdom with us lowly peons who have such a limited understanding of these concepts that we bore you. It must be quite a strain working around your yawns to come on to this site and educate us in these matters. How can we ever thank you?Can you ever forgive such a fog minded individual as myself for questioning your seemingly endless trove of knowledge and causing you to yawn with the boredom of it all? It is my sincere wish that one day you will see your way clear to finding it in your obviously enlightened heart to do so.

Oh...By the way and F.Y.I. right back atcha, ...I have just gotten off the phone with my friend, Mark. Mark is an Aikido Yoshokai Association of North America certified Aikido Shihan who works out of a small studio in Michigan, and who I happen to have known for, oh... I guess it's been nearly 40 years. We went to school together from kindergarten right through college and every time I make it back to the home state we spend at least a few hours together doing some free style sparring to compare our two preferred forms of martial art while we catch up on old and new times. He found your last statement to be quite original and informative to him. He asked me to thank you for helping him to re-arrange his teaching schedule. Based on your high level information on what is or is not "basic" training in his preferred style of martial art he can now speed up the training of quite a number of what he used to consider "beginner" students to include training against armed opponents much sooner than he, or his instructors, or those before them even, would have ever considered possible.He sends his best and agrees with me that your knowledge of Aichido is at least equal to the supreme level of knowledge about TCC you have demonstrated here and we are both amazed that you have managed to acquire such a degree of mastery over at least those two forms of martial art, and who knows how many others, while the rest of us can only dream of one day being considered as low lifes in the one style at which we each aspire.He asked me to make sure you understood that he, too, is now bowing to your superior knowledge and is basking in the glow of warmth that you have left him now that he has been enlightened by your greatness as well. He is certain that his beginner students will be forever in your debt that they can now start to be trained on bare hand against weapons techniques MUCH sooner than they, or Mark for that matter, ever deemed possible.Generations of future Aikido and TCC practitioners will speak your name with awe.I know both Mark and I allready do!